It is not easy to know why this was done, unless it be
true, as was then said, that Charles shared in the spoils of his bloody
deeds of piracy. However that be, Morgan, as governor, turned hotly upon
his former associates, and hunted down the buccaneers without mercy,
hanging and shooting all he could lay hands on, until he fairly put an end
to the trade which had made him rich.
Let us come now to the story of the Maroons, that nest of fugitives who
made things hot enough for the English in Jamaica for many years. When
Cromwell's soldiers took possession of Jamaica few or none of those
warlike Indians, who had given Columbus so much trouble, were left. In
their place were about two thousand negro slaves, and these fled to the
mountains, as the Indians had done before them. There they remained in
freedom, though the English did their best to coax them to come down and
enjoy the blessings of slavery again, and though they tried their utmost
to drive them down from the cliffs by means of soldiers and guns. In spite
of all the whites could do, the negroes, "Maroons," as they were called,
long preserved their liberty.
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